


Don't You Remember?

by AlysanneBlackwood



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz, Ghost Quartet - Malloy, Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 - Malloy
Genre: Character Death, F/F, Gen, Reincarnation, The Malloy verse, and some BMC, because I drag that into everything now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-16
Updated: 2017-10-28
Packaged: 2019-01-18 06:11:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12382509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlysanneBlackwood/pseuds/AlysanneBlackwood
Summary: Natasha spins.  Sonya lies.  Jeremy drowns.  Michael sickens.





	1. Part I

**Author's Note:**

> This is what happens when I listen to too much Ghost Quartet.

Natasha remembers.

In her memories she spins--spins the threads of tales so colorful and lively they could be real.  Her sister sits at her feet, ears pricked, eagerly listening.   She has so many stories, but there is one her sister loves.  So she tells it to her: _And Rose Red found the starchild in her mother’s arms, and she took her and blessed her in the sea._ It is a sad story, but she loves telling it all the same.  She tells it loudly so that he will hear it from his chambers.  He must hear her stories; else she will not be spared.  So she spins and weaves and spins and weaves, night after night, until finally, as the sun rises gold and orange from the greying sky, he tells her he has decided her fate.  She asks how he will grieve for her, and finds herself pleased when he says that he will miss her.  She thinks later that it is an odd reaction, to be so calm when she knows she is to die.  Perhaps she knew that it would happen.  One thousand and one stories is very many stories.  But one thousand and one stories is not an eternity of stories.  

Unable to feel shock or fear for herself, only a strange peace, she sleeps.

***

Sonya remembers.

In her memories she lies--the words fall from her lips easy as a stream of liquefied mercury.  She is in wooden room, full of people.  And there is someone she must speak to.  She sees her across the room.  A soldier, taller than her, dark-haired, dressed in a deep-green uniform, beautiful and lonely.  She approaches her and places a hand on her shoulder.   _If I told you when I saw you I felt a little shock, that when I saw you I began to cry and tremble._ The woman smiles sadly and says nothing.  She keeps speaking.  She must keep speaking.  She must have it, if she does not have it, she is certain she shall go mad.   _Will you dance with me?_ She leads the soldier to the floor before she can protest.  They dance, round and round, to the tune of some old, wistful song.  Her hands brush the soldier’s face, butterfly-wing-light.  She kisses her on the mouth softly, and the soldier responds, her hands warming her waist beneath her dress.  She feels something hard bump against her hip.  There is a bulge in the soldier’s right pocket.  She nearly pulls away from the kiss to take what she needs, though she stops herself in time.  The soldier pulls away first instead.   _What is that?_ She feigns naivete, gesturing to the content of the pocket.  The soldier removes it; a small glass jar glows golden in the warm, dim light.   _May I have it?_ She cannot sound eager.  It must be an innocent curiosity.  The soldier lowers her head and murmurs her request.  She complies.  She can wait a while for it.  So she waits, a painstaking portrait of patience.  And when the soldier has drunk, and they have danced again, the soldier swaying against her in the throes of intoxication, and wept, tears not her own wetting her cheeks, she hears the crack and sees the soldier crumple into the grey, pebbled asphalt.  She lays the gun, still smoking slightly, beside the soldier and picks the jar out from the pocket.  She pockets it herself, reveling in the sensation of it bumping against her thigh.  

Unable to feel remorse for her deed, returning home closer to the fulfillment of her desire, she sleeps.

***

Jeremy remembers.

In his memories he drowns--pushed into the cold, dark river by furious, wild hands.  There is the howling wind, crying in his ears, cutting through his clothes, and there is the rain, pounding from the starless sky-sphere to the earth, drenching him to the bone.  And then rude hands thrust him forward, and he falls in, sinking into the swelling water.  He gasps and swallows, choking on the sky-black river.  He cannot break through to the surface.  He claws at his throat, fingers scratching sickly-white flesh till it bleeds.  He sinks further; down, down, down, vision blurred, clinging to life till he begins to let it slip through his exhausted, frozen fingers.  Bubbles, tiny, bright globes shining in the dark, escape his lips and disappear.  They are the last thing he sees before his eyes flutter shut.  It is like going to sleep.  That is all it is.  Sleeping.   He must sleep now.  It is night.  He is too tired to stay awake.

Unable to struggle, limbs hanging limp and lifeless, he sleeps.

***

Michael remembers.

In his memories he sickens--ill and wasting slowly, he lies in a bed that swallows him, his breath rattling painfully in his ribs.  People sit by his bed, a man and a woman and another man, the last only a little older than him.  They watch over him pityingly, grieving helplessness etched in their features.  They whisper to each other.  He cannot hear them, though if they whisper of him, it is of no matter.  All he wants is her.  He wants her with him, warm and safe in his close embrace.  Where is she?  Where is his little girl?  Where is his little girl, where is she, the child he cradled in his arms while the cold seawater lapped at his bare feet, under a midnight-blue sky silvered with stars?  He turns to the people watching him, begging them for help, wailing the same questions without end.   _Little girl, little girl, where’s my little girl, where’s my starchild?_ They never answer, only press their lips into thin, sorrowful lines and bury their faces in their hands so he doesn’t see their silent tears.   _Why did you leave me?_ He cries the words aloud to the heavy canopy suspended above him.   _What is it that I did to make you disappear?  Come back, come back, come back…_

Unable to weep, eyes dry as bleached bone, he sleeps.


	2. Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The conclusion, as it always is, no matter the time.

_Leave me alone, yes, leave me alone!  I hate you, Sonya!  I hate you, Sonya!  I hate you!  I hate you!  You’re my enemy forever!_

The words cut deep, stabbing her soul to the heart.  She never imagined that Natasha could be so cruel.  But she has been.  No one here to love her now.  Nikolai away at war.  Marya Dmitrievna regards her with little more than a kind of scorn.  And she’ll be alone.  Abandoned.

_(again)_

For the man.  For the Prince Kuragin.  For

_(come look at the stars)_

She waits for the tears to blur her sight.  She is surprised when she does not collapse onto a sofa and sob herself hoarse.  Rage, uncontrollable and wild, churns in her stomach.  She realizes it was always there, lying dormant, waiting for the proper time to arise.  No.  Not again.  She can’t be alone again.  It can’t happen.  She can’t be alone with her fury again, left to seethe until she tears open.  No.  She is already torn open.  Her wounds, once so tightly stitched, gape wide and red and bleeding heavily afresh.

And the girl leaps upon her cousin.

(And her sister.)

(And her daughter.)

(And her mother.)

(And her lover.)

(And her friend.)

And no one hears the last, screaming gasps of the dying.

***

_Get out of my way.  Loser._

The words rip cruelly into his soul, echoing and laughing horribly, darkly, mockingly.  That’s their word.  Their word, used affectionately countless times before.  They took it back from the lips of their tormentors.  And now Jeremy is a tormentor, like the rest of them, his lips curled in cruel disdain as he shoves past him to leave the room.  He’s being left.  Abandoned.

_(again)_

For the people out there.  For--for

_(look into my telescope, tell me what you see)_

He waits for the sobs to choke him.  He is amazed that he does not fall to the floor and weep until he has no more tears left.  Rage, hot and overflowing, runs through his veins, setting his blood afire.  It’s been there for so long, he suddenly understands.  It lay in wait, and now it has awoken at the proper time.  There’s a panic in the rage.  No.  Not again.  He can’t be alone, left to die, not again.  He knows he will die, he will rip apart at the seams and the rage will run out of him.  No.  He has ripped apart already.  His wounds, closed so tight, have split open in ugly gashes and bleed heavily anew.

And the boy leaps upon his friend.

(And his sister.)

(And his daughter.)

(And his mother.)

(And his lover.)

(And his cousin.)

And no one hears the last, screaming gasps of the dying.

***

Dunyazad wants a story to chill her bones tonight.  Scheherezade remembers two that she never told Dunyazad before; she did not want to scare her but Dunyazad insists that she will not be frightened.  She is older now.  So Scheherezade allows Dunyazad to sit at her feet and she weaves the two tales.   _The girl, Sonya, grew angry, and she could not contain her rage.  She leapt upon Natasha and strangled her to death, her pale fingers leaving small, ugly bruises against her dark throat._ Dunyazad’s eyes widen, but she does not flinch.  She asks for the second one.  It is very similar, Scheherezade cautions.  Is she sure she wants it?  Dunyazad nods, and Scheherezade continues.   _Michael, unable to be left alone, became furious, and he leapt upon Jeremy and strangled him, his fingers crushing the pipes of his throat to useless, crumpled things._ Dunyazad’s eyes stretch even wider, but once again, she makes no sign of fright.

 _Have these stories happened, for real?_ she asks.

Scheherezade ponders her answer.  A strange feeling suddenly comes over her--a premonition, almost.  And she knows.  She knows what her answer is.

 _No,_ she replies, looking down into Dunyazad’s bright, upturned face.   _But they will happen.  What I told you will come to pass, someday._

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this. Constructive criticism is appreciated!


End file.
